Three Ways to Quickly Convince your Client with a New PPC Strategy

We’ve all been there. You have a new strategy for a client, and given that the client’s time is not infinite, you only have a few minutes to convince them of the worth of the strategy. This short amount of time is also combined with the fact that your PPC efforts are but one prong of a multi-faceted advertising strategy that often employs more traditional (and easier to discuss) marketing channels. All this being said, it is easy to see that oftentimes, your great new strategy oftentimes isn’t given the time it deserves in the eyes of your client. So, instead of sweating and ranting like Gil from my favorite TV show, “The Simpsons,” here is a concise strategy with which to approach your “pitch.”

Don't be Gil

1. The Big Gun-ROI

For those who don’t know, ROI is calculated as such:

How to calculate ROI

This should be the first thing you target. If your ROI is consistently profitable to your client, reminding them of such should help your cause. This, of course is dependent on whether or not you have access to your clent’s sales figures, or at least data on how your clicks lead to sales. This is not always possible with some accounts, but for those marketers who do have access, this figure is an invaluable tool. If you consistently bring the client a great ROI, and have been doing so consistently, bringing up this figure while propositioning a new strategy will no doubt help your cause. This brings me to my next point.

2. Let Google do the talking

It is a safe bet to say that Google is a fairly well known name. You, or your agency, may be well known in the PPC industry, but chances are that name recognition doesn’t follow in terms of your rapport with your client. So, when discussing new strategies or increased/decreased bids, let Google talk for you. Let me explain.

Like Ron Burgundy, people know Google. Google is kind of a big deal...

There are many speculative metrics associated with the Adwords interface. For instance, check out the Opportunities tab from time to time. In addition to giving you ideas for new keywords to add, the Opportunities tab also gives you budgeting ideas by showing you how many clicks/impressions/conversions an increased budget could bring in. Tell the client these figures, and be sure to highlight that this is a move suggested by Google. Use their brand trust and recognition to leverage your ideas.

In addition, there are a few newer metrics that Adwords has rolled out to help justify your pleas for more budget (or different allocations of budget). Bring up the metrics of impression share and relative CTR. Impression share shows you how many impressions you are missing due to ad rank, budget constraints, or both (in the combined impression share metric that takes both ad rank and budget). If you are consistently low in terms of impression share, let your client know this and justify this as a reason to reconsider budget. Relative CTR is a measure of how well your ads are performing on the display network. A rank of 1x or higher shows that you are performing better than your competitors, but one lower than 1x shows that your competitors are outperforming you. If you are being outperformed by competitors, you can use this to leverage a new strategy. Be it a new landing page, more budget, new ads, or anything else you want to try this metric can really help your argument. Now, with both of these Google metrics, don’t be so bold as to say “Google says do this!”, but then again sharing that this is a Google metric will really help out your argument

Impression share is an important metric.

3. Keep it surface level

Your client isn’t dumb-chances are they know some about the industry. However, you don’t need to go in depth with your new strategy to the point of extreme detail. Let them know what your overall strategy entails, and if they go for it, great. If they want more detail, give them more detail. Basically, don’t bore your clients. Give them the results expected, and if they enquire how, give them the details.

So hopefully these strategies can help you to sway your client to try out your new techniques or budget considerations. Just keep in mind the three points: ROI, Google stats, and don’t go too deep.

In this new live webinar, Kristin Vick from Hanapin Marketing and Jeff Sauer from Jeffalytics discuss how marketers can ensure they have the budget they need to be effective with online advertising and get the right tools to make that argument.